História Musical de Noel Rosa / Historia Musical de Noel Rosa

Marília Batista disputes with Aracy de Almeida (still after the death of both) the title of best interpreter for Noel Rosa's compositions. Rosa declared that Batista was the one. Until the most complete compilation of Noel Rosa's works (fruit of Professor Omar Jubran's research, bringing 228 compositions of a total of 259) comes out, this is the most comprehensible collection of Rosa's tunes. Batista is a good singer anyway. Her voice was taken from her old 78 rpms and received an orchestral dressing, signed by one of the most important composers/orchestrators of Brazilian erudite/popular music, maestro Guerra Peixe. Maybe the thing that first captures the imagination is a heavily syncopated violão, which could only exist after bossa nova. The orchestration, nevertheless, remain faithful to those times' usage, even if always carrying the mark of a vanguard arranger. But some may prefer to listen to Rosa with a regional (the traditional accompanying group, with violão, seven-string violão, cavaquinho, and pandeiro) backing. The booklet has a good deal of information (in Portuguese) about the historic facts surrounding the Rosa/Batista association, but makes no mention about the year of the release or the history of this recreation for that matter. This double-CD reissue has 60 of Rosa's compositions, with several medleys devised to cope with the challenge of covering such number of songs in only two discs.